


After Midnight

by Captain_Kieren



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, Caring Donna, Drabble, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode: s04e10 Midnight, Fluff, Gen, Hugs, I love Donna, Midnight, Missing Scene, Not Shippy, Oneshot, Short, The Doctor (Doctor Who) Needs a Hug, The Doctor and Donna are best friends, Trauma, but you could read it that way i guess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-16
Updated: 2018-11-16
Packaged: 2019-08-24 15:39:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 798
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16643009
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Captain_Kieren/pseuds/Captain_Kieren
Summary: Donna comforts the Doctor after his traumatizing encounter with the Midnight entity.A short missing scene for 4x10, "Midnight."





	After Midnight

The Doctor is the last one out of the emergency vehicle.

            The other passengers surge ahead of him, clinging to each other and crying. The only dry eyes belong to an elderly man in a sweater vest and a teenager with slick, black hair. The boy casts Donna a weary look on his way by and, despite his carefully neutral expression, she can see terror in his eyes. Real, icy-cold terror.

            Well, this is not what Donna was expecting when she came to meet the Doctor.

            She heard over the intercom that something had happened on the tour to the sapphire waterfall and that the passengers were being brought back, but she’d assumed it was just a mechanical failure. Some kind of glitch in the vehicle.

            When the Doctor steps out of the vehicle, his eyes look…wrong. Distant. His dead gaze is straight ahead and, although Donna is walking right toward him, it takes him a second to notice her. So unlike the Doctor.    

            The closer she gets, the clearer his fear becomes. Locked down inside of him, just like all the emotions he doesn’t like to show. Sadness, regret, anger…

            Fear gets locked in too, under a shield of blank, dark eyes and a stiff jaw.

Donna’s learned to read those expressions.

Even when he finally sees her, his expression doesn’t change. There’s no forced smile that says “I’m fine.” Not even an attempt.

God, what happened?

Donna pulls him against her without a word. He wraps his arms around her, but only loosely. It doesn’t feel like he’s all there.

Still, Donna buries her face in his shoulder, closes her eyes, and just holds him a while longer.

“What happened?” she asks after a moment.

“I don’t know,” he says. His voice is low and raspy like he’s been screaming or crying. Or both. He sounds as hollow and frightened as he looks. “I don’t know…”

Donna pulls back, looking into his face. It’s still stiff. There’s still a pinch between his haunted eyes. “Did the touring vehicle crash or something? Was anyone hurt?”

“Four people died,” the Doctor says quietly. “But not in the crash.”

Donna has a sick feeling growing inside of her. She’s seen the Doctor face all kinds of horrors. Pyroviles, Sontaran, Vastha Nerada… What could have happened to shake him up like this? “Doctor,” she says. “You’re starting to scare me – and that’s not an easy thing to do. Please tell me what happened.”

“Something got on board.”

Donna blinks. “What do you mean ‘something’? An alien?”

He’s looking past her, like he’s still not here. Not in this moment - but still back on the bus. Reliving the horror in his own head. “I don’t know what it was,” he tells her. “I’ve never seen anything like it before. It…” He swallows, voice wavering. He speaks through gnashed teeth like he’s angry, but he’s not. He’s terrified. “It got _inside_ me, Donna. In my head. It—it knew what I was thinking. It took—” He stops, face screwing up. “I couldn’t move,” he says, slower. “I couldn’t speak.”

Donna watches his eyes grow misty.

“I was scared.”

She recognizes the look in his eyes now. Granddad used to look like this sometimes, when he thought about the war. It’s trauma, pure and simple.

Donna grabs him again, pulling his body back against hers, mostly so he won’t see the tears slipping down her cheeks. “Well, it’s all right now,” she tells him, forcing her voice to be even and strong. “Whatever happened, it’s over. You’re safe.”

She crushes him with her arms and he doesn’t even try to pull away. He just lets her hang onto him and they stand there in the bright atrium, hearing the babble of flowing water and the quiet, tinkling music from the spa.

After a few seconds, she feels him relax into her with a sigh and Donna smiles to herself, rubbing the stray wetness from her eyes. “What do you say we go sit down?” she asks, pulling back.

The Doctor still looks perturbed, but the aggressive wrinkle in his brow has softened and she knows he’s going to be okay. Maybe not today, but eventually. “Yeah, sounds good,” he says. As they turn and walk toward the row of tables along the window, the Doctor takes Donna’s hand and gives it a squeeze.

“I’m glad you weren’t there,” he says quietly. In some way, Donna wonders if she should be offended, but she isn’t. It’s just his way. A _thank you_ of sorts. An _I’m glad you weren’t there to see that._

And Donna is glad too. Whatever it was that happened on that bus, if it was bad enough to scare the Doctor, she’s glad she wasn’t there to see it.


End file.
